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The thing about Scar is this- he has never believed in anything star-crossed, and he certainly won’t start now. Fate is a cheap tool used by weak men (and Scar has not let himself be a weak man in a very long time, not in the ways that count.) to shift the blame of their actions and the inevitability that exists in worlds like these onto greater forces. He has always been the type of person willing to write his own story. Now, keeping that in mind. Scar is soul-bound, and he does not care.
It’s funny how desperately he would have wanted this only a world ago. Someone to stick by his side and keep him company, to look at him and see him beyond the mask and the lies. It’s funny how much he took having this for granted only two worlds ago. Here and now, he finds himself utterly indifferent to the magic at play. Whatever had been forced upon them by joining this world would never match or replace the tragedies that had already been written. He wouldn’t let it.
It’s strange, to see people taking to their tethering so easily. Bdubs and Impulse build their house together and the new clock on the former’s hip has the same markings as one he had bargained back to him lives ago. He wonders if they remember the betrayal clearly anymore, and wonders how they moved past espionage and withers and abandonment. He wonders if it’s really that easy.
There are, of course, outliers. Scott and Cleo, forever raging against the system that trapped all of them here have abandoned their bonds already. He’s not sure if he respects the audacity that the two hold, or if he hates the way it makes Pearl look so lonely, and Martyn look so angry. He remembers Scott and Pearl, back to back at the end of the longest night, long after he himself had fallen on his own arrow. He doesn’t need to wonder how a winner and their teammate can go so wrong so quickly. He remembers Martyn and Cleo, fiercely loyal to a fault to opposing forces and doesn’t need to wonder how it feels to be willing to die for someone and then turn around to have no one left to die for but yourself.
He has a soulmate out there in this world. The pool of people left who it could be is quickly draining, and he doesn’t care. Scar has never needed anyone but himself- the fact that someone has to live with his heart in their chest is not his problem, regardless of the foreign heartbeat he can feel thrumming in his own. The growing pit in his stomach doesn’t exist, and he will not think deeply about the man that has once again gravitated to his side.
Fate isn’t real. There are no greater forces at play looking for a story- they just look for destruction. If they wanted a good story, his last death would have had meaning. His misery would have been purposeful. Now, keeping that in mind. He’s missing something important. Everyone keeps looking at him strangely, like they’re laughing at a joke he isn’t in on yet. Grian drops the dripstone on him for the second time, and Scar cannot bring himself to pull his eyes away again as the shard that lodges itself in his shoulder cuts a matching hole in Grian’s. Their hearts beat in sync, misplaced in each other's chest, and fate is not real. Horror dawns on his face and bitter acceptance marrs Grian’s, and Scar can’t help but think that on the off chance that something like fate existed- it would be cruel enough to do this.